He sold his home at a loss and then started to check off items on a hastily created bucket list, most expensively spending about $25,000 dollars on a 10-day trip to a five-star hotel in Fiji with his wife.

Frank, who ran a handyman business, also gave away about $25,000 worth of tools and began smoking, a habit he had quit when he was initially diagnosed with cancer.

After his trip to Fiji, he came back to New Zealand to die. But every morning Frank would wake up and feel as good as the day before. About 23 months later, Frank learned the reason he kept living was because he had been misdiagnosed and was actually cancer-free. His doctors had figured this out months before, but for whatever reason Frank had never been informed.

Although he is happy to still be alive, Frank isn’t so thrilled that he blew all of his money and then spent the last two years not working or planning for the future. He is currently about $60,000 in debt and he and his wife say they’ve lost all faith in the health system.